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They look an aweful lot like other rat snakes, what puts them in a different genus? The significantly smaller size?
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The genus Elaphe has been used to refer to both old and new world ratsnakes, an extremely varied group of snakes many very different from the others. Elaphe been going through a major overhaul recently due to the use of DNA sequencing. There have been all sorts of rearranging and realigning of species.
For instance even the common cornsnake (formerly Elaphe guttata) is now being refered to as Pantherophis Guttata instead.
Of course, like engineers, taxonomists love to change things so who knows where it will go!
